CNET First Look

Samsung Convoy SCH-U640 (Verizon Wireless)

Despite a couple of design complaints and a missing feature, the Samsung Convoy is an easy-to-use phone with great performance.

2:00 / 21 November 2009

Transcript

[ Background music ] >> Kent German: Hi I'm Kent German Senior Editor here at CNET.com. Today we're gonna take a first look at the Samsung Convoy also called the SCHU640 it's a new phone for Verizon wireless service. This phone is a little like Samsungs Rugby which serves AT&T and not so different from Motorola's Virage [assumed spelling] which also was for Verizon. It is a rugged phone so it has a tough plastic shell, rubber sidings and it does have a lockable battery cover that you actually have to turn this knob here to get it off. The phone isn't completely waterproof so I mean if you splash water on it if you get it wet it's gonna be fine cause it is certified to military specifications so just be careful on that sense. Here in the front you'll recognize it is a rugged phone, pretty nice external display actually. It's full color, it works as a view finder for the camera lens just above also shows all the information you need and you can also use it to get to basic menu functions so you can get to your calendar. You can get to your music player so I did like that a lot. Down below the dedicated menu keys use them to access your music player of course and to get to the menu functions that I talked about a second ago. Open up the phone the internal display is bright and colorful. It does show a little bit of that Verizon menu structure getting away from that though. But it is nice that you can actually rearrange the icons in the icon menu format and you can actually add new menu choices and remove old ones so nice customization there. Down below key pad and controls most of them are flat with the surface of the phone but they are pretty spacious. These keys are flush but we could dial and text pretty quickly and they have a bright back lighting. The phone has a pretty decent feature set you'll find a 2 megapixel camera. Photo quality was actually really good. Other features include messaging, personal organizer, Bluetooth with a stereo profile. It is a 3G phone so you get the VCast video and the VCast music. The music quality is pretty decent. Voice quality is actually really good. I really didn't have any complaints at all. [ Background music ] >> Kent German: The 3G connection seemed a little shaky. It took about 2 minutes to download a song which is a little long but on the whole the phone's a good performer. I'm Kent German and this is the Samsung Convoy.